\n The star midfielder has claimed his first Club best and fairest award.\n <\/p>\n
\n By Western Bulldogs Media\n <\/p>\n
Superstar Bulldogs midfielder Ed Richards has been recognised for an outstanding 2025 campaign, winning his first Charles Sutton Medal at Crown tonight.<\/p>\n
The 26-year-old stamped his authority as a premier midfielder of the competition during the season, edging out six-time winner and captain Marcus Bontempelli by 13 votes in a thrilling count.<\/p>\n
Playing in his seventh season, Richards took his explosive game to a new level, gathering 26 disposals and six clearances per game, while kicking 22 goals as a full-time midfielder.<\/p>\n
Richards\u2019 ability to burst from stoppage while standing up in pivotal moments was rewarded earlier this month with a maiden All Australian blazer.<\/p>\n
Featuring in every game this season, Richards kicked multiple goals on seven separate occasions and signed a new five-year deal at the back end of the season.<\/p>\n
After missing the first six games of the year due to injury, Bontempelli averaged 27 touches, six clearances, five marks and more than a goal per game after his return.<\/p>\n
Bontempelli secured best and fairest votes in every game after Round 13, coming home with a wet sail to just fall short of Richards after receiving his 200th vote in the Brownlow Medal a fortnight ago as he finished equal sixth.<\/p>\n
Veteran Tom Liberatore was third in the Charles Sutton Medal voting, with Aaron Naughton and two-time All Australian Bailey Dale rounding out the top five.<\/p>\n
Mature-age recruit Sam Davidson claimed the Chris Grant Best First Year Player Award after playing 19 games on the wing during his first season in red, white and blue, while Bontempelli secured the Jon Van Groningen Trackers and Guides Award voted by the players and coaches.<\/p>\n
Rhylee West\u2019s impressive campaign that yielded 39 goals was rewarded with the Tony Liberatore Most Improved Player Award, with Rory Lobb claiming the Brad Johnson Best Team Player Award.<\/p>\n
Star forward Aaron Naughton was the recipient of the inaugural Simon Beasley Score Impact Award, which recognises the player that contributed the highest combined total of goals and goal assists for the season.<\/p>\n
TOP 10 – CHARLES SUTTON MEDAL <\/p>\n
Ed Richards \u2013 299 votes
\nMarcus Bontempelli \u2013 286
\nTom Liberatore \u2013 279
\nAaron Naughton \u2013 252
\nBailey Dale \u2013 228
\nMatthew Kennedy \u2013 227
\nSam Darcy \u2013 222
\nRory Lobb \u2013 212
\nJoel Freijah \u2013 192
\nRhylee West \u2013 189<\/p>\n
OTHER AWARD WINNERS<\/p>\n
Chris Grant Best First Year Player: Sam Davidson
Tony Liberatore Most Improved Player: Rhylee West
Brad Johnson Best Team Player: Rory Lobb
John Van Groningen Trackers & Guides Award: Marcus Bontempelli
Scott West Most Courageous Award: Sam Darcy
Locker Group Coaches Award: Joel Freijah
Footscray VFL Best and Fairest: Billy Crofts
VFL Coaches Award: Will Lewis
John Schultz Community Award: \u00a0Tom Liberatore
Bruce Wilkinson Trainers Award: Ed Richards
Simon Beasley Score Impact Award: Aaron Naughton
Ingrid McDonald Award: Brendon Lade<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The star midfielder has claimed his first Club best and fairest award. By Western Bulldogs Media Superstar Bulldogs…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":182553,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[560],"tags":[638,64,63,55,639,85,83],"class_list":{"0":"post-182552","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-afl","8":"tag-afl","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-australian-football-league","12":"tag-australianfootballleague","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-text"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182552","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=182552"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/182552\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/182553"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=182552"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=182552"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=182552"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}